from the Journals of Morningstar, Warforged Wizard
by rsmyth
Summary: An account of the wanderings of Morningstar 776 Series C, Warforged Wizard, in the time after the Treaty of Thronehold in the D&D setting of Eberron.
1. Chapter 1

from the Journals of Morningstar 776 Series C, Warforged Wizard

by Richard Smyth

CHAPTER ONE

Date: 25 Aryth 996YK

It takes two weeks for the news of the Treaty of Thronehold to reach us on the battlefield outside of Cragwar, where our units had been assigned to protect the diamond- and gem-mines of the Blackcap Mountains from Aundarian and Thrane raiders and invaders. I will never forget that moment: I was in the middle of a chess match with my captain. I was losing, for I was programmed to lose: the Series B version of Morningstar 776 never lost at chess, to the annoyance of its officers, so Series C was produced to correct this minor oversight. I am unable to plan more than five or six moves out, and as a result am prone to making errors in strategy and tactics. When playing a skilled opponent, I am very much able to lose, and there is never any sure winner as with Series B.

This is very much like life, I have concluded after many evenings of contemplation watching over my snoring captain.

(And so it was at the end of the Last War. Who can be said to be winner? Who loser? Can the nation that bombed the Mournland out of existence be called "winner"? Our units were defending the gem-mines of the Blackcaps, a region whose control had passed between Aundair and Thrane and Breland throughout the Last War. We had "won" the territory, but the consequences of winning included many new responsibilities, our unit's assignment among them. And always the fear of losing them back again, to one or another of the nations. The meaning of winning is fraught with complications, I believe.)

(I write this many months later, while in the care and training of Larendil, hermit wizard of the Icetop Mountains. Unlike humanoid memory, I recall all things perfectly and vividly.)

So there I was, considering my next move, when the news of the Treaty came. My captain stood up, whooped for joy, and ran among the officers in the control tent, hugging and celebrating. Alcohol was served, and men caroused and danced and hooted. I made my move and sat back, waiting for the game to resume. But it never did. Later the next afternoon, when the captain finally stirred from his revelry, he approached me, looking sad.

"Morningstar," he said. "The game's over. You're free to go. The Treaty grants your kind freedom. Isn't that wonderful?!"

Free? Freedom is like winning: fraught with complications.

"It's your move, sir." I replied. "Your position is tactically sound. You have many advantages. If you continue to play correctly, you are bound to win."

"Morningstar," he said, more insistent. "The game is over. The war is over. I'm going home to my family. You are free—free to go."

"Free," I said, leaning back. I didn't move for two weeks.


	2. Chapter 2

from the Journals of Morningstar 776 Series C, Warforged Wizard

by Richard Smyth

CHAPTER TWO

Date: 13 Vult 996YK

After two weeks of deliberating the meaning of the word freedom, I moved into action. Freedom, I concluded, is the ability to make decisions and to take action based on one's own volition. As a warforged construct, I have never had the luxury of making my own decisions; I was made to follow orders. So making decisions was an alien concept. I decided to go to Cragwar, the nearest city, and "go from there" (as I heard my human officers say).

Being free, I realized during those days of uncertainty, means not knowing what's going to happen next. It's like being in the middle of a story with no way of knowing how it will end, or where the next plot-twist will lead. Being free was being alive. I was truly alive for the first time in my life.

There were others of my kind on the field of battle, fighters who weren't granted the level of intelligence I required as an aide de camp. I tried to reason with them, but reason was not programmed into their training. They awaited orders from commanding officers who were gone from the field of battle forever. I left them standing there, dumb, mute, useless.

In Cragwar, I wandered the busy streets filled with people, carts, marketing stands, animals, dung. None of the people was in battle garb, bore weapons, or marched in formation. It was total chaos, and the noise—of salesman yelling, cows lowing, dogs barking, children shouting, pigs grunting, chickens squawking—was cacophonous. I saw a placard with a griffin in a storefront: HOUSE JORASCO: WARFORGED RELIEF CENTER. I made my way there.

Inside were a few of my kind, sitting in chairs, staring blankly. Behind the desk were Halflings tending to my comrades. When I finally spoke to a counselor, I was informed about the Heroes of Breland Land Grant Program. She filled out an application for me and told me to check back in a month.

I followed one of the warforged who finished just before I did to a squatter's camp east of the city, in a small wooded area.


	3. Chapter 3

from the Journals of Morningstar 776 Series C, Warforged Wizard

by Richard Smyth

CHAPTER THREE

Date: 17 Vult 996YK

I try to earn money by playing chess in the central square marketplace . It's a joke for most of those who approach; their friends push them forward to play with the freak. I hear what they whisper, or say out loud with no fear of hurting my feelings. For what feelings does a warforged have? Most of them think the warforged are brainless automata made only for war. They find out soon enough after I beat them. Occasionally one with some skill plays, and the crowd gathers around to watch as if I am a sideshow in a carnival. That's fine; it's good for business.

I try to get other jobs but no one hires me, some openly sneering at my request. And so it is that I make my opening moves, but people refuse to play. What do you do when they won't let you play in their games?


	4. Chapter 4

from the Journals of Morningstar 776 Series C, Warforged Wizard

by Richard Smyth

CHAPTER FOUR

Date: 22 Vult 996YK

I met a small boy a few days ago, Elmeri is his name. He was part of a group of orphaned ragamuffins who accosted me with rotten vegetables as I departed for the squatter's camp, but he hung back after they ran off. The skin on his head was burned; he was hairless on one side of his head, and his ear was gnarled like one of the roots they sell in the marketplace. He told me of his life, how his parents were killed in the fire that burned his face and arm, and how the other orphans picked on him because of his appearance. For this reason he took pity on me. Though he is young, his experience has given him a wisdom beyond his years, and we have become comrades. He sleeps with me at the camp, among the other warforged refugees, and I teach him what I can about the game of chess, in which he has taken an interest from seeing me play in the market square.


	5. Chapter 5

from the Journals of Morningstar 776 Series C, Warforged Wizard

by Richard Smyth

CHAPTER FIVE

Date: 25 Vult 996YK

As I play chess with a former officer in the Breland Army, one who fought on the Cyre front, I notice that Elmiri is with the leader of the orphan band that attacked me the previous week. I see them glance over at me before wandering off. Later, Elmiri returns, and it isn't long before he asks me about the Lord of Blades.

"Who?" I ask.

"The Lord of Blades. He's a rebellious warforged who is building an army in the Mournland, east of here. Have you not heard of him?"

"I have heard whispers at the camp, but nothing more than that. Why do you ask?"

"I thought maybe you were a spy or something." Elmiri's face turns red when he says this, and he looks away.

"You thought? Or your tall friend thought?" I replied. Elmiri stared for a moment at me before running off. He didn't accompany me that night to the campsite, nor did I see him again until New Year's Eve.


	6. Chapter 6

from the Journals of Morningstar 776 Series C, Warforged Wizard

by Richard Smyth

CHAPTER SIX

Date: 1 Zarantyr 997YK

I decide to leave Cragwar, leave Breland, and head east, toward the Mournland. Perhaps there is a place for me among the warforged who inhabit that blasted landscape. I don't think there is a place for me among humankind. Especially after what happened last evening.

It happened during the New Year's Eve celebrations. At first, all was well: people worked their magics, making lights blaze high in the sky or soar like birds through the city streets, just above people's heads. Many caroused drinking Demon's Brew or Swamp Wine from the Shadow Marshes, and as the night grew darker the magics grew more reckless and dangerous. At one point, Elmiri beckoned to me from an alley, and when I followed him I was set upon by older orphans who had some mastery of magic and who cast spells which immobilized me. My one and only comrade in the world had led me into a trap. While immobile, they stole my possessions and hit me with hammers and crowbars, leaving me broken upon the ground. I lay quietly for what seemed like hours, trying to gather my strength, but before I was able to lift myself a band of carousers lifted me and threw me in a fountain. Then, long after midnight, a drunken bum came stumbling up to the fountain, and he shouted at me as I lay in the water, gesticulating wildly. When he fell in and we near embraced, he ran off and brought the guards, claiming that I had attacked him. The guards, fed up with everybody at that point, lifted me out of the fountain and carted me off to the city gate, where they dumped me in a heap outside the wall. I awoke this afternoon, with comrades from the squatter's camp working to heal my wounds.

I was trained to identify patterns--among deployments of battalions in a field of battle, among chess openings and mid-game strategies, among my officer's behaviors and personality traits. After last night, the pattern of human behavior has crystallized, and I know I must leave. There is no point in waiting for any land grants, for such a gift would require that we be considered on a par with the humans who made such a proposal. And it has become apparent to me that this will not be the case--not anytime soon, not in Breland. Though the Treaty of Thronehold granted us status as free living beings, it is obvious that it will take some time before what is written in paper becomes written on people's hearts.

So when I am healthy and able, I will set forth, knowing not where I go nor why, simply hoping to find some refuge in the wild.


	7. Chapter 7

from the Journals of Morningstar 776 Series C, Warforged Wizard

by Richard Smyth

CHAPTER SEVEN

Date: 15 Zarantyr 997YK

I have been traveling now for almost 12 or 13 days, day and night without resting, through the woods just east of Cragwar, over the Lightning Rail tracks south of Fort Light, into the Harrowcrowns, and then along the Brey River, under the overpass for Lightning Rail, to the outskirts of Arythawn Keep. I was delayed in the plains west of the Harrowcrowns, for a host of halflings were about, attacking a nest of ankhegs--large insects with six legs and chitinous hides--that had been attacking their caravan on their way north. Though I was trained to intervene in such situations, I have resolved to avoid contact with all humanoids, to prevent attacks like those I suffered in Cragwar, and so simply waited for them to move through before continuing on my eastward path.

As I approach the spires of Arythawn Keep, I cross the river and cautiously approach the Keep, staying low in the water, hidden by the mists, and traveling only at night. I watch the warriors battle off strange creatures coming out of the dead-grey mist that rises like a wall. This must be the Mournland that my comrades in the squatters camp spoke of.

I will cross into the Mournland on the morrow. There are certain to be no humanoids in that inhospitable realm.


	8. Chapter 8

from the Journals of Morningstar 776 Series C, Warforged Wizard

by Richard Smyth

CHAPTER EIGHT

Date: 20 Zarantyr 997YK

For five days have I traveled in this desolate realm--through broken cities, abandoned farms and blasted barns, rubble everywhere. And as I travel I have counted 1,001 horrors it would seem: a hill of screaming skulls begging for their lives; faces forming out of swirling mist and screaming in pain; a forest of trees made from bone, with brittle skin dried all around like leaves; infant ghouls eating their long-dead mothers on the side of the road; shadows burned into the ground and the walls of blasted buildings. I am traveling just south of a great chasm that sends forth a bright glow high into the sky.


	9. Chapter 9

from the Journals of Morningstar 776 Series C, Warforged Wizard

by Richard Smyth

CHAPTER NINE

Date: 24 Zarantyr 997YK

I see the jagged skyline of Metrol from afar and steer to the north in order to avoid the horrors that await within and around the city limits. Somewhere near the Dead-Grey Mist, which also became visible from a good distance away, two elemental-powered landcarts approached from the north, manned by warforged refugees. When they saw me, they began to approach. I didn't move. They didn't speak. There was no need for speech. After they stopped, I simply climbed onto the cart, and we traveled deep into the wasteland of Cyre's former (or the former Cyre's) capital.

This is how I came to be among the followers of the Lord of Blades.

I was taken to a large government building in the city center, a vast ruin of concrete and steel. We went into the basement and then, through a secret door, into a kind of catacombs that led to various underground bomb shelters. Some mid-level officer interviewed me, and, after hearing my story and determining my potential for loyalty and commitment, I was assigned to a regiment and sent forth to join them. We traveled again on an elemental-powered landcart through the city, heading south, along the border of Lake Cyre.

As we left the city limits, I heard the haunting wails and howls of the ghostbeasts that gathered around the cart as we sped past--hairless humanoids with translucent skin that glowed with a pale inner light: more lost souls of the Mournland, a tribe I now seem to have joined myself.


	10. Chapter 10

from the Journals of Morningstar 776 Series C, Warforged Wizard

by Richard Smyth

CHAPTER TEN

Date: 26 Zarantyr 997YK

We arrive at a base camp south of Lake Cyre, some nameless city blown off the map on the Day of Mourning. I am quickly delivered to my regiment leader, whose name is Hammer, and he introduces me to my squad leader, Halberk.

There are about 50 members of our regiment (named Shadow Regiment), which is part of the Khyber Division, and 9 members of my squad. When I arrive, the regiment is drilling in the field. After some brief discussion and rearrangement, I am given a place among my squad, which has its place in the larger whole of the regiment. We are preparing for a large-scale division-wide drill and inspection by the Lord of Blades himself.

I am among many different varieties of warforged, all of whom were originally created for different battle functions. But, here, apparently we are all as one, with no hierarchy and no differentiation. As it should be.

I have finally found a place for myself in the world, where I am to be accepted as I am.


	11. Chapter 11

from the Journals of Morningstar 776 Series C, Warforged Wizard

by Richard Smyth

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Date: 2 Olarune 997YK

It is during our drill and inspection that the Lord of Blades singles me out. I was on the outer edge of our regiment and so was easy to see as we marched by his command tower. He abruptly called a halt to our march, walked up to me, and stared at my ghulra, the runic whorl on my forehead, as if in disbelief. Then he said, "You are a Morningstar, are you not?"

"Yes, sir." I replied. "776 Series C."

"Come with me," he said. And off we went to his tent, the temporary command center.

As we walked, he talked to me. "I am a Series A. I recognized the pattern of your ghulra."

"I have noticed that different models share a similar pattern while also being unique unto themselves."

"Yes--it makes it easy to recognize the different models and thereby assess their strengths and know their original purpose, though it is my policy to mix models throughout the different divisions, unlike the human tendency to have entire units and regiments of the same type. Not that any of them would ever know, never having been trained in advanced pattern recognition algorithms, as we have. What are your enhancements?"

"Not many. Improved motive detection, enhanced officer relations, improved charisma, the like."

Then he stopped and looked over at me. "Of almost 1,000 warforged warriors, some created here in the Mournlands, most wandering refugees like yourself who have come to join the fight for a better life, you are the only other Morningstar that I have encountered."

"We were a late model, created for--"

"I know all of that. That's neither here nor there. What this means is that I will need you to be one of my commanders. You have the advanced intelligence and training that will make you a successful leader."

And so I am to be a general in the Army of the Lord of Blades.


	12. Chapter 12

from the Journals of Morningstar 776 Series C, Warforged Wizard

by Richard Smyth

CHAPTER TWELVE

Date: 5 Olarune 997YK

The Lord of Blades takes me, alone, on an elemental-powered landcart for a full-day's ride into--or under--the Glass Plateau. We have spent the last few days together, going over logistics, troop count and hierarchy, strategy. Today he says he has a surprise.

The Glass Plateau, from afar, looks as though the sky shattered and fell to the earth in jagged shards, sticking into the earth and jutting upward in a fractured hodgepodge of geometries. The outer edges are translucent, lighter like the thick glass of tavern mugs, but toward the middle it becomes darker and darker until, right in the center of the cluster, the glass is almost black, shining like obsidian.

As we enter the maze-like shelter of the Plateau, he points to the markings and code that direct him toward our destination. We go deeper until, toward the black center of the mass, we enter caverns that run deep into the earth. Eventually, we come to a central cave where the hidden forge, source of so many rumors, is kept. Several warforged surround the device, firing the furnace, shaping the metal, sculpting the materials into what will be a living form.

"So this is what so many fear," I manage to say.

"Yes," the Lord of Blades replies. "What we want is their fear. This forge is a symbol of our independence, of our frustration, of our determination. It is meaningless as a source of true threat, for production is slow and often goes awry. Our true strength comes from those such as yourself, who come to us disaffected by the treatment we receive in the wider world. Humans created us as their warriors, and now they create us as their foes. And we will meet their expectations now just as we did then!"

We continue through to the other side of the Plateau, emerging near the outer edge of the Field of Ruins. We travel right up to the edge of a battlefield frozen in time: soldiers in mid-strike, weapons poised above their targets; faces fixed in silent death-rattles; swords plunged deep into bodies; skulls cloven by battle-axes; flags undulating in a long-forgotten breeze. Thousands of soldiers frozen in mid-battle, perfectly preserved by some strange magic through the years following the Day of Mourning, as if a living tableau were created in a vast museum under the stars, in memory of the darkest moment in Khorvaire's history.

The Lord of Blades gestured at the vast battlefield. "And this is how we arm our warriors."


	13. Chapter 13

from the Journals of Morningstar 776 Series C, Warforged Wizard

by Richard Smyth

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Date: 7 Olarune 997YK

We return to the base camp in the evening, and immediately upon our arrival the Lord of Blades orders that the entire army be assembled at parade rest. After they have all fallen into place--a feat undertaken in complete silence, aside from the characteristic clanking of warforged plating scratching and the thumping of bootprints--the Lord of Blades addressed the assembled army.

"You will see upon my shoulder blades the heads of two humans. These two attacked us while we toured the Field of Ruins, scouting armor and weaponry for the glorious battles to come, when we achieve the Promised Time, when warforged reign over all of Khorvaire and humanoids bow to our power!"

With that a shout rose up from the ranks, and row upon row of soldier stamped their feet, creating a thunderous din.

As the Lord of Blades continued with his rousing rhetoric, my mind drifted off as I thought on why he would lie about killing the humans. I then had a revelation: it was all about fear. Fear was the lever that he used to pull in disaffected warforged throughout the Five Nations. Fear it is that he used now by lying about humans attacking us. By feeding our fear of slavery, by turning us against the humanoid races, the Lord of Blades secures our loyalty and simplifies the patterns of behavior that humans manifest.

I then remembered my first friend, the orphan boy Elmiri from Cragwar. His life, too, was filled with fear: fear of rejection from his peers, fear of being harrassed and alone. And the warfare among the nations: all of it, driven by fear. My own anger, too, when attacked and ridiculed on New Year's Eve: it too a result of fear, the grand pattern of all feeling beings.

It was then I knew that I could no longer be part of this. If fear motivates both sides in a struggle, then we are nothing but machines driven by our emotions, each side distorting the perspective of the other, oversimplifying their true motivations in order to demonize them and justify acts of cruelty and destruction. Once one comes to such a realization, it is impossible to lose oneself to it enough to participate as a true believer.

It was then I knew I had to leave.


	14. Chapter 14

from the Journals of Morningstar 776 Series C, Warforged Wizard

by Richard Smyth

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Date: 10 Olarune 997YK

Since being singled out by the Lord of Blades for recruitment as a general in his army of fear, I have often been relieved of the more mundane tasks of soldiering in order to begin my training. This has involved accompanying him on inspections, interviewing lesser officers, and discussing strategy as we pour over maps of the Mournland and surrounding areas. He speaks of mounting invasions into Darguun, Zilargo, and Valenar. The more I come to know him, the more I come to see him as insane--driven as he is by this singular quest to overcome and subjugate our former masters.

On the morrow, the Lord of Blades plans to purge the army of suspected traitors, and he intends for me to prove myself and my loyalty. This is another aspect of his insanity--this constant fear of betrayal, this scrutiny of all for any sign of disloyalty. It manifests as abject tyranny, as when, last night, he shredded the tendinal roots of Gauntlet in front of the whole regiment, leaving him in pieces on the ground, broken yet still living. All for merely failing to show him the proper respect.

I must make my break in the morning, or I will be forced to kill my own kind, for suspicions of a paranoid megalomaniac.


	15. Chapter 15

from the Journals of Morningstar 776 Series C, Warforged Wizard

by Richard Smyth

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Date: 11 Olarune 997YK

Early this morning, I go off with the salvage crews to plunder weapons from the Field of Ruins. My plan is simple: I will feign being wounded, which will slow me down, and then, when I am far enough behind the others, I will slip into the Glass Plateau and wander through the maze of broken shards until the crew is gone, leaving me behind for lost. Then I will head due north, toward Karrnath, in haste. Away from the Mournland and its brotherhood of hopelessness.

As I go among the shattered fragments of the Glass Plateau, following the secret markings the Lord of Blades showed me on our last visit, I seem to feel the reverberations of the forge deep below. I realize that I have not lied to my fellow soldiers: I have been wounded, ever since entering the world of men, deeply wounded, and I have yet to recover. Is there a place for me in this world, I wonder out loud?

In this jagged garden of glass, I see my face reflected back to me one hundredfold, a multi-dimensional geometry of fractured identity. But then the glass darkens, obsidian-black, and I can no longer see my self at all.


End file.
